Our journey in the Autism Spectrum

Posts tagged ‘butterfly’

Message from the Editor: I am truly honored and thrilled to have Kara from karacteristic.com guest blogging here today! Kara is an awesome mom to a brilliant and beautiful little girl, Ellie, who has Asperger’s. Our families met last year at an ABA Parent Training Program at TouchPoint Autism Services. I am very proud (and a lot grateful) to be able to call Kara my friend. Not only is she inspiring as a creative, super-mom parenting in the Spectrum, she is an artist and published (contributing) author, and one of the funniest! people! on! the! planet! Thank you, Kara! And CHEERS!~Karen

And without further ado, here is Kara:

One of my fondest memories as a kid, involved making my own Halloween costume every year. Planning started in August and I had a Mom who threw herself into the creative process with me which made it lots of fun. I started that tradition with Ellie. My little Aspergian has loved bugs since before she could talk. As that was at the tender age of nine months, we’ve been hearing about bugs for four solid years she’s been talking about bugs for quite some time. So, I wasn’t surprised when she wanted to be a butterfly this year. I was, however, surprised by the following:

* The detailed schematic drawing I received of the desired costume.
* The desired costume is to be half Monarch, half Blue Morpho.
* It needs to have a thorax, abdomen, proboscis, and compound eyes.
* This butterfly will have stinging capabilities and web-making skills.
* When the butterfly moves, it will leave a trail, much like a cartoon character showing motion on tv.
* The butterfly wings will light up for added drama.
* In some way, a time line will depict the butterfly’s life and include the egg, caterpillar, pupa, and chrysalis.
* Larger than life milkweed and flowers are necessary for caterpillars and butterflies need sustenance.

As I type this, I’m suffering third degree burns on my finger tips from the hot glue gun, not to mention a tremendous lapse in creativity/logistics/physics abilities. If any of you have ideas for showing cartoon motion in real life, I’d be forever grateful. Also, please send band aids. And tequila. Happy Halloween!